Perspective

"It's so lifey" says my friend as from an open jar wingless fruit flies stumble into the fish tank. Supported by the surface tension of the water they bob about until they are spotted and eaten by the goldfish below.

It's so lifey... Real, brutal, cyclical, the transfer of energy, growth, change.

The Internet brings me news. That of national and international importance and the opinions that come along with it.
Slavery.
Racism.
Abuse of power.
Abuse of innocence.
Oppression of the disadvantaged.
Degradation of their humanity... Of our shared humanity.

A lot of the time it's the obligatory ranting about the political system. I am liberal, I am progovernment (not the current administration, but democracy in general and the machinations that keep a country running successfully) I read opinion with interest. Issues that I never thought affected me, swerve into my view through the comments and shared content of my friends.
The opinions vary.
Some leave me saddened at the reality faced by others and those people are afraid. A few shock me into realising that some friends don't share my own views and those people are afraid too... And that scares me in turn... As I see my own moments of weakness where I am all too quick to "other" people... And I am grateful to the country that saw fit to rescue my grandmother from the slavery she had endured during the 1940s. I am afraid that in this time, here and now, she would not be treated so kindly.

Closer to home people I know and love, live the fullness of life. And I hear of a friend in her 50s who lost her mother... A close friend whose grandfather is gravely ill, a young family grieve for their newborn daughter. And I weep. A mother comes upon the anniversary of the death of her son. A friend contacts me daily to say how bleak their life has become in their own eyes, and I will them to keep reaching out and walking forwards. Three young women share their daily battles with a crippling chronic illness that is all too real yet so often dismissed.

I know so much life, too much life and I can not unlearn what I know of the pain and sorrow of others and I would not want to. All of those who are suffering reached out and held me when I was, they listened, they commiserated, they reminded me of life's fragile beauty and they held my hand and kept me connected and journeying forwards. This reminds me not to fear... To remember that my opinions are built on the foundation that this life is both good and bad, but more importantly... it is all important.

#ThinkThanks... It begins!

[Pre-Script: I like Gilbert and Sullivan... I sang some as I entered the church when I married my AMAZING HUSBAND in August this year... They sometimes gave their works alternative titles the alternative title for this blog is as follows...]

How I got to be grateful for some really odd stuff (and other stories from friends)

I am grateful for some really odd stuff. Some things especially about myself which I have come to love.

I am really grateful, for example, that I'm relatively shy when it comes to dating... I wouldn't have met my husband otherwise. We met online our friendship and subsequent relationship was kindled across vast distances and we didn't spend a great deal of time in each others physical company... this was ideal for us... we grew together slowly and deeply. It's an oddity we each have that has been the making of our most precious and joyous marriage. How amazing is that?!

I'm grateful I'm tall I can wear beautiful long dresses and I am always first to spot my friends when meeting up somewhere, plus a quick glance can tell me if a restaurant or cafe is too full.

I'm grateful my mother made me stick at the piano lessons when I was six... I am still a terrible pianist, but I can play well enough to write my own music and then I get to hear people who are far more talented pianists than I am perform it!

I am grateful for Facebook and Twitter. Most people could live without social media.
I could, however the internet generally has brought me some of my strongest and closest friendships. If I had never met some of the folks I have over the years I would never have grown in all the unexpected ways I have done. I have found reserves of kindness and goodwill within the words and gestures of people from all over the world. I have been tested and challenged and have seen others share their brightest and darkest days with me in trust. I feel greatly privileged to be part of the lives of so many other souls out there in the world.

Rainbows always make me grateful!

And that brings me to the second part of my title I'm inviting other people onto these hallowed pages for the month of November. It's a month when many people I know practice gratitude with the USA Thanksgiving day falling in this month and the year feeling like it is drawing to a close it seems an apt time to consider those things which cause us to feel joy, and delight and say thanks.

I have for a while been a long distance friend of a community in London known as New Unity. And during November they are cultivating gratitude with a great hashtag as a reminder...

#ThinkThanks.

Those catchy eleven letters encapsulate an attitude I want to grow myself.

The act of thinking of thanking for many things... small things, large things, things which comfort me, things which scare me and those which force me to change.

And so I've invited other people to share in writing my blog for the rest of the month.

• There are going to be posts for EVEN days only (so there is less pressure on myself!)
• Posters are going to be from my wide circle of RL (real life) and online friends.
• Some may post under their own names others may make anonymous contributions
• Everyone will be talking about thanks/gratitude
• And anything (within reason) goes...

I am incredibly grateful that some friends have already signed up but if you want to have a go yourself please get in touch.

That's all from me for now... I may post alongside others contributions as the month unfolds... As always I look forward to learning lots and having fun doing it!

Weddings, Love, Self

I got married a few weekends ago. August 23rd 2014 will forever be the date I signed the marriage register of my church along with my best friend ever, witnessed by our siblings.

The whole ceremony was framed beautifully by our friends and really was a true celebration of the most heartfelt love between myself and my now husband...  Back to love later... 

I was an unnaturally calm bride. I don't mean I was cool as a cucumber and everything was closely under control...  I mean I was calm with the help of additional chemicals. Namely the antidepressants I've been taking recently... I still enjoyed the wedding but the medication by it's very natural shrinks everything by at least a little.

I sang as I walked into the church and down the aisle... People who heard me were surprised... I must have nerves of steel. It's not true... It's the only way it wasn't going to be obvious that I was anxious... It gave me something to be anxious about... It wasn't a surprise to the assembled congregation if I didn't look up from my bouquet during the procession... That was just because I was singing. I used the same tricks when I was standing out the front... They were an audience I was a performer... Look up towards the back of the room and smile... No one will think you're not engaging. Other than that I kept my eyes firmly affixed to the beautiful face of my beloved. A few individuals received a glance and a smile.

I was shocked by the heartfelt response of our friends and family to our wedding. We had made it genuinely about us... As all wedding celebrations should be... We generally weren't swayed by tradition or the voices of people who said there was a way we should be doing things. And at the end, everyone who was involved said it was very us.

I struggle with being unique. I don't like to conform, but when my self esteem is crippling low and I just want to be "normal" I often find myself compromising my true wishes for the fleeting comfort which comes from something which seems unlike me, but will win me favour with someone else. In the end with my wedding I let a few of those things by...  I had my hair and nails and makeup done... People thought I looked beautiful...  In the photos I can hardly believe that it is indeed me. I would have been as happy if I had done my own hair and makeup, but it didn't seem like I was sacrificing anything if I let others do these things for me as a gift.

Sometimes though I wish I had the ability to choose for myself more... And be okay when others judge my decisions.

So I need to learn to love and value my own thoughts and feelings... When I suppress them it only serves to break my heart a little and when I am learning that I am so loved by others I would do well to accept that and love myself more.

Chocolate cake

As I begin writing this, I was just a few minutes ago licking melted dark chocolate from a wooden spoon and pondering.

In my oven just now is a cake... a cake neither of my grandmothers would recognise.

I have written about them both before in relation to other things (Babcia http://sodifferentstuff.blogspot.com/2014/01/imagine-this-re-imagine-this.html and Granny http://sodifferentstuff.blogspot.com/ )

But today I want to write about baking... The everyday kind.

I can not for certain tell you much about the baking of my Dad's mother.... She died the day before my first birthday, but from my father I have heard stories of yeasted doughnuts filled with apricot jam, and poppy seed cake fresh from the oven and still slightly warm with coffee. The thought of both of these things makes me want to book a flight straight to Krakow!

My Granny and I though, we shared an understanding about cookery. I was her helper... not that I was around that much and she didn't really need me to do anything. We both had our places in the kitchen, at some point my grandfather had extended part of the worktop to allow my grandmother a large rectangular surface where she had easy access to the sink and the stove top.
My spot was on a wooden stool at the "breakfast bar" in the corner where I would eat my, specially purchased for the visitation of grandchildren, chocolaty cereal each morning and where over the years to stared at a succession of toasters of different styles colours and levels of gadgetry. One of which I clearly remember the handle broke off and it had to be operated with half a wooden sprung peg.

Anyhow I was Granny's helper, it was unusual for her to have company in the kitchen. The kitchen to my grandfather, like many men of his generation was a strange foreign land from whence they would be shooed when they started to prevent the work of preparation and such taking place. My grandmother had not been a stay at home mother, in fact she worked as a teacher even after she had her children and when I was small she had been retired several years and actually seemed to quite enjoy having her own domain. She had a beautiful view of the garden from her work area, and a chest freezer full of... well everything possible... bread, stewed apples, cuts of meat.

And so it was that I took to sitting often in silence watching my grandmother cook, I was fascinated by the mixer, the slicer, the pressure cooker. We would talk... topics of conversation I forget... but I learnt things about my grandmother's kitchen which came in useful when my mother and aunt were clearing the house after my grandfather's death. We also became quite close as I sat and watched her. I overheard her say to my mother a few times that she greatly enjoyed talking with me. I watched her bake coffee sponges, biscuits, brandy snaps, mince pies... And I'd fetch things from high up places she couldn't reach so well any more...  And make jam clangers with the left over pastry which she taught me to shape and roll.

The last proper conversation I remember us having, alone, was at my grandparents house as we were making preparations to move her to the residential and nursing home where my grandfather moved to after his stroke. They had been married for over 50 years and didn't really know what to do without the other close by. She hated being spoken about... Especially in hushed tone...  She and I were together in the dining room I'd been at the piano and had finished playing and moved over to where she say. Her social worker, my aunt and my mother were in the sitting room. She leant over to me and asked said...  "They're speaking about me again...  Instead of to me...  I wish they wouldn't do that....  I'm not completely unaware." I remember being struck by her tenacity, she was too polite to tell my mother directly that she'd like to be more involved in her own future and she did trust that her children were doing the best things by her, but I knew that the reason she shared how she felt with me was because she saw me as a friend, and she was unsure and frightened.

In the years after, in the home, after my grandfather died I missed us being alone...  We were never alone any more and there was no more baking. There was always someone else there...  In her room my brother, sister, uncle, aunt, father, mother. She became frailer and her command of language slipped from her grasp slowly. In fact her stubbornness meant she refused to speak if she couldn't find the right words.
I spent one last time alone with her before her death. I don't remember visiting again... It actually became to painful to hear my mother rabbit on at her in a one sided conversation. So when I visited the Wirral in 2010 I went both to the Frankly to see my grandfather's grave and to The Manor to visit granny. I had my mobile phone with me... And I have video on there of the choir I was in at the time... I played her a little and I remember how very wide her eyes were. She had no idea about the technological advances of the first part of the 21st century.  From here perspective standing in front of her was a young woman with a tiny television. She never lost her grip...  Not that I remember...  I would always kiss her cheeks as I left her and it would take her hand and squeeze it.  She would squeeze back, and I would lean over and whisper that loved her. If I did she her again before she died I don't remember it clearly enough to recall. I must have done, because she changed rooms in the home... And I remember taking the stairs up to her new room, but I remember nothing else of that visit.

She wouldn't have recognised the type of cake have made but my favourite thing to watch made was her apple pie.. It was large and deep and packed full of sliced apples sprinkled with nutmeg and cinnamon. She did teach me to make it but in the time since I have never have found the heart to try. I suppose I find myself thinking that if I make the pie I have closed a chapter we shared and started a new one of my own... I soon might... Maybe this autumn when there is a fresh crop of cooking apples in the farm shop I will stew them sliced and in layers like she did and when I am making the pie I'll take a spoon and taste the tart unsweetened juice and giggle to myself like we used to together.

I wrote this...

I wrote much of this in my head,  in a sort of internal dialogue while I was driving my car to the supermarket. I was as I say driving at the time,  and you may worry I was not concentrating on the road. So rest assured that I know for certain that I was concentrating very hard on driving because the part of the journey where I was doing this thinking is etched into my mind.

Also thinking about what I wanted to say in the following text gave me a headache, so naturally I carried on thinking about it all around the supermarket  as I ticked off things on my electronic list and scrabbled around for items to replace those the store didn't stock.

I was wondering how I came to enjoy writing. Directly to type, like this, because I know for certain that the advent of my ability to write is almost inextricably linked with the decision my family made in the mid to late 1990s to "get online".

I know this in part because I remember the hundreds of blank pages of my childhood exercise books/jotters and the red responses from my teachers that informed me of the occurrence of one or two regular events in my earlier/pre-teen school life:

A) That I had written almost nothing... I remember a lot of stories that started and never finished because try as I might my right hand was just not capable of going any faster. Or that I tailed off part way through an idea.

B) What I had written was illegible... Teachers often asked me if I was left handed so shockingly awful was my written presentation... Even worse than being leftist many of my teachers were also sexist and wanted to know why I wrote so much like a boy and in not beautifully formed text like the other 24 girls in my class (I'm excluding my sister from this...  She suffered the same presentation issues I did)

The other thing that would happen that my teacher never commented on since in the context of my writing, because they couldn't see it, was what happened in my head when I was asked to write. I did not, as some people say when asked why they have not done something,  have no ideas... I had the exact opposite...  I had too many ideas... The fact that there was nothing on the page or alternatively, everything looked like it had spilled out there as an incoherent scribble was that I was either trying so hard to wrestle one strand of thoughtful response to the stimuli from the screaming mêlée or I had given up trying to appear coherent and they were going to get everything I had whether it were relevant or not!

The issue with presentation and getting started didn't go away once I reached secondary school (from 11yo onwards) for the most part it got worse, there were more subjects and homework to manage,  and I lived the furthest away from my school it was possible to live and therefore I had to wait for my dad or mum to get out of work and collect me from the library where I waited after the bus journey.  I'd finally get through our front door at around 5.30... Then dinner, then homework.... I did lot of my work in the school library just before lessons or on the bus on my knee on the way into school! Initially my teachers were pretty hard on my lack of diligence and due care to my work but as I got older I learnt to get by with enough input to get through my classes and I was ubiquitous enough to get away with the occasional late, or sometimes entirely absent, submission.

Examinations were a physical challenge to be practised for... I didn't need to revise, in the main I could scroll back mentally to the actual time we had studied a topic in class and work from there. So unusually my study time was often devoted to handwriting practise where I filled page after page of patterns and letters which helped my fluency and devouring other people's texts in the form of novels so I had used up the extra in imagination that may get in the way of my thinking.

So the thing with my writing is that I only recently realised I can write. I have a voice. It's such a strange realisation to make,  and I think it's probably something akin to the child who learns to walk not actually being all that sure how it happens. I love the Internet,  I have since I first heard Joanna Lumley bid me "Welcome to AOL." I just guess I never saw online chat as writing.

I talk. A lot. I am in almost constant dialogue with someone else if I am around people,  and if I am alone or appear silent I am probably saying something in my own head to remember for later or rerunning something that already happened. Even in my sleep I dream with conversations. So my writing voice developed as a natural extension of my interaction with what I would now call digital media... But back then I called simply IT. I used chatrooms to make friends and develop relationships with others... I was at an age and inclination that I just accepted this new form of communication as entirely natural. In fact in many ways it was preferable to the awkward social interactions I had to perform with my peers... I was an "awkward" teenager... I know everyone says that in their lifetime... As if what a terrible time you had as a teen has some sort of resale value in later life,  but for me it truly was painful... I hated being in between the carefree existence of childhood and the responsibility of being an adult. My outlook and interactions were reasonably mature for my age and this singled me out for some pretty rubbish experiences. I was not interested in doing anything remotely irresponsible and I certainly had exactly zero interest in dating anyone! Combine that with the remoteness of my home to those of my school friends and naturally I became an early adopter of many social networking tools, MSN, forums, chatrooms, later MySpace, Second Life,  Facebook and Twitter.

Over time, to me, every word I typed on the page became a word I spoke verbally out aloud in my own head, the same way someone would voice the characters of a book. And it became my voice, a way to have clarity...  I realised I was good at writing about myself in glowing prose when I completed job applications, but that the young woman who attended the interviews was not initially who the recipient's of the forms thought they would be getting... I had come alive in text form at the same time as realising that the adult I had naturally returned to become was more introverted and reserved than I  had been as a child. I have said before that there is something about being a twin that makes you ubiquitous... It is almost impossible to be a shy pair of identical twins... I honestly don't know of any... Even those where there is a natural inclination in one or both of the couple, there is something so fascinating to most other people, about the similarities of speech and posture and gesture that is so often expressed in stereo, that one becomes available to speak with others about this unique perspective pretty much whenever called upon. I realise with hindsight that the best company I often have is my own and I felt a deep contentment in solitude.

That said what people are always surprised about when I speak about my experience with online communities and communication is how honest I am. Everyone fakes a little...  It's a natural inclination... If we don't feel well but need to work anyway or if we are nervous about something. However the media for a long time portrayed online communities as frequented by hundreds of people who basically lied about every detail of their lives. Now those people do exist, but they really are in the minority. Just as they exist in a bar when a married person pretends to be single to flirt with someone. Or when someone knocks a few years off their real age to give a more flattering image of themselves.

I have always made sure I am me.... I don't doubt that over time who I am has been to a greater or lesser extent shaped by my online interactions, but the same again is true of face to face encounters. I don't give out my details to everyone I meet, but I do offer them genuine connection, and find I get back in return generosity and encouragement that spurs me onward in tough times.

Writing this blog started because of something someone said about making those sort of genuine connections... I realised that although my long held pseudonym had become an inextricable part of my own identity, that my name and general location were really powerful things to share with the world, if I believe that in working together we achieve more, more than the sum of the parts, more than any one can alone.

I wrote this and shared it here because I can, and because in part I am compelled to write, and share and debate and discuss, because my belief in connection via the Internet is so strong and important to my own identity. I have written of myself and in the writing I have seen my own strength and endurance and that perspective has helped... It's work but it's in the main enjoyable and I'm glad you are reading. 

Thank you for connecting, I am deeply grateful. 

Whoever you are.

Wherever you are.

I wrote this... For you. 

Treasure Chest Part One

Since early 2012 I have a been the custodian of a treasure chest. I knew it was a treasure chest because it was beautiful and I had originally had to dig it up from a mysterious place to which their was no map.

In 2011 we knew my grandmother was dying. She was old, she was frail, she no longer spoke or communicated in any way other than with a glare or a glance or the squeeze of a hand... And even then, these were open to wildly different interpretation.

Mrs Agnes Patricia Boote, widow of Alexander John Watson Boote. She was the mother of four children... Iain Alexander, Margaret Jennifer, Barbara Joan and Malcolm Graham. Married the same year as the current Queen Elizabeth II of England and her Prince Consort the Duke of Edinburgh. She had been a dedicated mother and grandmother.

Her children however were not always the best at communication. In fact, I think that the only time they had a been together in the same room, before the four of them took turns to sit with their mother as she slipped from this life, was the funeral of their father, my grandfather in 2002.

In the end "Mothers" death was peaceful and she was to be buried after a simple funeral and at my aunts insistence with the love spoon a relative had carved depicting her four children and three grand children in the caged peas which my mother would have much rather she had been able to keep... My aunt had been taken ill suddenly the week of the funeral and was in hospital unable to attend. But since no one had got much sleep for the weeks before hand we all assumed that she was just under the weather and would recover. Alas history teaches us to make no assumptions.

Barbara Joan Boote passed away just days after her own mother's funeral in the a critical care unit specialising in the aftercare of people who have had brain injuries. She had without any trauma suffered from a hemorrhage caused by a previously undetected anurism. Like her parents her illness and untimely death was ultimately caused a stroke.

I do not feel I really knew much about her personally until she was gone even though she had been a constant if distant presence in my childhood... I certainly had no idea how much alike we were until people who knew her well who I only met at her funeral and memorial would catch me doing something which they recognised as of her... I miss her deeply, but ironically because her death made me realise how much I had already missed spending time with her. And especially now as in a few weeks time I will be married, and she won't be there.

I already have one precious treasure of hers, my engagment ring is a perfect fit for my hand as the size and shape of our hands is something we shared... We also both liked to write... In the 1980s before the advent of the Internet she would type up her letters and she wrote to her close friend Jane amazing, and often quite hysterically observed, tales of Christmases with the Boote family and the baby twins her sister had... We found some copies of her letters, in her flat when we cleared it after her death.

Some other things she and I also shared were: a tendency to hoarding; obsessive collecting; a flair for DIY and designing and building our own furniture; a love of floral fabrics; buying reduced hosiery; a belief that we should have enough crockery to have as many of our friends to our homes as would fit at the drop of a hat; a love of real pearls; the natural ability to excel at piano playing (but no desire to practise); a love for London (which found her living in Putney, but me being content to hop on the train from the West Midlands!); Ikea (including coming home with the maximum amount of furniture whether that's Barbara's version of one woman on a bus or my unpacking the frame to a sofa bed in the car park in freezing pouring rain to squeeze into my Suzuki Alto) and many other hundreds of things besides.

There were of course ways in which our lives had naturally taken different paths... I don't really drink... She really enjoyed her red wine and I have never smoked (but I love the smell of cigarettes... Which is part of the reason I never tried.)

Sadly though it was obvious to us all, when we had to clear up her one bed London flat to sell, that periods of depression and anxiety had written there way into the story of her own life as they have mine. The flat was crammed with stuff and was so messy you could barely see the treasures... Now I know that I am still trying to work my way clear to not remaining in the position I know my aunt was in of living with every bill from 1989 filed carefully but not able to walk from one room to the next without tredding on something important. It makes me sad that she didn't have the haven she so desperately needed.

That said I am only really describing the owner of the treasure in the smallest of ways and to give those reading these words an insight into why this treasure is so important to me. It is the affinity I feel for the owner of this magical box that makes me feel better when I look at everything which is contained within. Because in exploring it I find out somethings about someone whom I love who I can no longer answer my questions.

END OF PART ONE TO BE CONTINUED...

Why it's important to fight stigma

Below are a few extracts from a, then private, email to my now fiancée I sent over 7 years ago. I was 22 we were dating long distance and things should have been really good, but I'd started on a college course I was really struggling with and I knew things weren't going to get any better. In some ways writing this email saved me, it started me on a journey that I'm not sure will ever end... Because the honesty I expressed to the recipient of this letter has been solidified and strengthened.  Now I am in a place where I think it would be useful to talk about the practicalities of needing and seeking help, without stigma. I know this is something that needs to change in our view of mental health. I'm sharing this because it is obvious reading it back now how frightened I was of the possible repercussions in my future of being honest about my struggles.

The course I was on at the time was a PGCE a postgraduate certificate in education. I had already dragged myself through an undergraduate degree in a cloud of disarray and confusion. I truly believed that anyone with a history of depression would be considered unsuitable to work with children so my actions,  or rather inaction was affected by this position.

The email...

"I am so sorry I haven't been able to be happy and smiley.... it's called depression and I've been here before and if I get diagnosed with something like this I may never be able to get a job and that's before I've even finished this course. This wouldn't be the first time you see... it's on my medical records as mild depression.... just a low and fuzzy feeling... it's not you that makes me unhappy"

"I need you to understand that I get depressed... proper can't feel much past desperate but won't admit there is anything wrong or maybe I just can't get out of bed... I need to know that it's part of me and that you'll still love me and try and understand and that if I push you away it's not because I want to but it's because I'm scared... I'm scared of hurting you with my words and actions so much that I'll want to  not speak to you one minute just so I can feel the happiness of making up because I can't find the feeling otherwise. I am going to talk to the doctor about these things, but I need you to understand I'm not making it up. I have stood on train platforms holding back tears with a thread of reasonability and common sense telling me that  too many people would not get to work if.... well you see.

I have a tendency to put things out of proportion.... hence the 10 phone calls in 3 minutes.... I panic.... like anxiety kind of panic where I can't breath and can't think about anything else."

I didn't go to the GP...  As far as I remember I was too frightened of loosing my place on the course, of admitting failure. My hand was forced eventually, when I was in serious jepody of failing my placement and I was completely lost. I got a little help, but I refused medication when it was briefly mentioned in a dismissive and unhelpful manner by the locum GP that I saw just once. I thought that this would make it more obvious that something was wrong with me .
My college tried to help and I had a couple of conversions with a useless college counsellor who handed me some photocopied sheets about self esteem and recommended some herbal remedies. And I was allowed to defer my college work until the next term when I could try again.

That was the sum total of my treatment until late last year when a friend persuaded me that suffering was not really preferable to getting help and I had fallen so low that I was past the stage of caring what any one else thought of my decisions.

If when it had first gone on my records aged 20 that I should be followed up and I had been offered some talk therapy maybe things would have been very different. I am not asking to change the past I am wanting to change the future of treatment of mental health conditions in young people.

The stigma is embedded in our society, those closest to me unfortunately encouraged me to not talk about it,  to keep it quiet and to "be okay" rather than be honest.  They were trying to help because the stigma is as real as the illness, but everything has still had to be dealt with eventually.

Mental illness is already a hidden ailment, with most people who are suffering simply going about their daily lives and making adjustments where they can, but we must begin to talk about support and help for those who need it when they need it.

Just lately I have been very lucky to have come across the right people at the right time and the internet has been an invaluable source of support, but assessment by mental health professionals much earlier could have saved my time and strength.

The literal cost of stigma is written in the pattern of our society like letters through a stick of rock. Those who need flexible working,  those who can't work, those who have been hounded out of jobs with no understanding or support. This has both a financial cost and a human cost which is quite frankly too high and things should be very different.

Speaking out now is something I can and must do.

It's time to change.

Day Thirteen- Being Ready

BEING READY

A gentle trigger warning.

This post is not intended to shock. It is meant to frame something that needs to be said. There may, for some people, be triggers within the following text. No harm is intended and I hope you scroll down and read on.

I have wanted to write about this for a very long time, but I knew if I did, the writing had to be clear and constructive. An angry tirade in this case would serve no one well. Especially myself since as a dear friend said... There is no putting the toothpaste back in the tube.

This story is about FORGIVENESS, why it is so important, and worth pursuing.

On Day Eleven of this Thirty Day #WeBecomeWhatWeDo cultivation project I was up in the wee small hours of the morning having not yet made it to sleep from Day Ten. I was wondering about things, mainly my career choices and options for different avenues I could explore. Was I truly ready to explore them or just looking for reasons to complain about work?! As I lay in bed thinking it was about time to put those thoughts away and sleep I spotted a friend was up online on Facebook, and since I know she is ill at the moment I sent her some hugs. It turned out she was having a bad night, had woken up in terrible pain and was quite distressed. As we talked, she relaxed a little, and the pain and panic subsided slightly, she realised then she was probably awake for the next few hours until her next dose of medication. I suggested distraction was probably the way to go to fill the intervening time and, since she is unable to do much physically at the moment, some reading may be the best option. This friend is very encouraging, and we fell to talking about this very blog. I said she was welcome to read back through the archives as a distraction, but provided a gentle warning about the content of my post from late last year about sexual harassment. Being the encouraging soul she is she was compassionate about how that my have affected me a I found myself typing my disclosure of another incident... I didn't write angrily... just in a clear and concise way explained the situation...

"I was abused... In a specific scenario. I do not mind people knowing. But the current news has triggered some stuff. The blog is about how dismissive we are of inappropriate touch in teenagers."

The exchange continued and I expressed some feelings of guilt and regret.

You see the scenario I speak of happened over 20 years ago. It was a "one off" event, but that made it no less powerful in terms of changing the way I viewed my own body and that someone had definitely without my consent put their hands where they did not belong. This happened to me in such a strange circumstance that it did, for many years, make it easier to bury the experience entirely and to find ways of getting around it and the associated thoughts and feelings. However I did carry them with me into adolescence and young adulthood where with hindsight and realisation they became deeper ingrained and heavier to carry. I have been on a roller coaster with my mental health since around about the time of this incident, and although there are many other factors in my story overall, this one has insidiously glued itself to my sense of self worth and esteem and messed with my right to define my barriers and acceptable parameters in relation to what is tolerable behaviour from others. And so it was that from my friend I was reminded of a truth I have heard many times before...

"If you have suffered abuse in any form you should not feel guilty about it. However slight or however bad it is not your fault. The abuser is the guilty one and you must never let go of that."

Maybe her use of the words 'let go' were what triggered my response, but a penny dropped and I gave the most honest response to this advice I have ever given.

"He was just a young man himself. He is entirely forgiven."

And just at that moment as I said goodnight to my dear friend I was done burying my pain away, and letting it continue to be a burden. Because I considered for the first time how holding onto a hurt was serving me. Yes, the abuser was guilty in the sense that he was the one responsible for his own actions, but I am responsible for my reactions. His was the fault... But the burden of blame was hurting me and not him... If I had a time machine I would have done anything to prevent that event ever occurring. But it did happen and today's reactions are no time machine. I didn't have to let go of the truth of matter, I was never at any fault for the situation I was in, but I could let go of something else.... My anger... With no way of changing the past why should my reaction today be about regret and blame?

That whole process in my head took seconds to occur... And what I had typed and read before me was almost entirely new information even for me.

"He was just a young man himself. He is entirely forgiven."

You see what I had always said to myself was... 

"He was just a young man himself. It was not his fault."

I was trying to be kind... I was trying to let him off... I was attempting compassion. I thought, mistakenly, that forgiveness meant finding a way to erase the incident. But it can't be, we can not change the past, just our response to it in the present moment. In trying to not find fault in what he did I was denying that it had indeed hurt me immeasurably. In accepting that he was at fault, but it was in my power to forgive him anyway I was not lying to myself anymore and there was peace in that.

I was not at fault.

He was.

Forgive him anyway.

If you are reading this and you are in a place of hurt and despair yourself you may be thinking... 'That's all very well for you to say, but it's not that easy'

I grew up in Christianity.

I was steeped in the idea that ALL I needed to do was forgive, and I tried so hard.

The moment I realised I was ready to forgive forever came after a lot of hard work and heartache, it was definitely not easy. But what had made it possible was the compassion of others, each time someone else held their own light close to me in my darkness a small part of my pain melted away until eventually after many, many years when I had carried my pain so long I thought it was too late and it would be with me forever, it became time.

Keep going, tell your story, share your truth with others and maybe even sometimes, tell them how much you are hurting.

Because even though there is no way someone else can entirely lift your burdens , carrying them alone is hard and letting go of them can happen slowly, but surely.

Day Eight- Why it takes so long...

So I sort of rushed into my plans, even AFTER I wrote so much about why I start and fail to continue on Day One. I am still thrilled with the direction I'm headed in and the plans are definitely still amazing, but I should always learn to cut myself some slack! I have been continuing with my pledge to worry less.. and I have had a few nights of brilliant sleep and many moments carefree joy spent with friends and family. But the gremlins are sneaky and they crept up on me a few times and a couple of times have succeeded in derailing the best of my plans over the last seven days. I am also definitely achieving and making sure I celebrate each step no matter how small or insignificant they look to others, it took thousands of years for the Niagara Falls to eat into the rock bit by little bit and look at them now!


Even with the derailments though, the fable says slow and steady wins the race and so if I have to think tortoise and be tortoise, that is how it will have to be.

When I first found out that New Unity were planning a month of cultivation I was a little confused… It sounded like a fabulous idea but I pondered a little about whether such an idea was really all that helpful. Surely if we needed to change stuff we’d- just do it, on our own, with no prompting. (I am laughing so hard at the ridiculousness of that last sentence I may need medical attention!) Of course it isn’t that easy… There are many HUNDREDS of stories where persistence pays off, it’s OLD wisdom, really, really old… and in todays fast paced life (apparently that’s old too… modernity of every era always feels faster than before ;) ) we say it a lot, but we rarely take heed. I often have no idea what the journey is that I have started upon until I am way along the road and even though I have along with many others set aside these 30 days to explore my practice… well this is just a chapter on a journey I started a while ago and a road I am still travelling and because it may help others I’m going to tell a little of the story here for you.

A little part of our home...

In spring/summer 2010 when the government changed and austerity began to creep into the public services and the grip tightened on the purse strings I was let go from my amazing, but basically temporary job. It had been a great job, my boss had been kind, I had been very reasonably paid considering my experience and it had allowed me to get back on my feet after a really difficult time personally and career wise. At some point that summer my parents suggested that maybe my brother would move in as my lodger and we could share the responsibility for housework and bills. He was HORRIFIED… He’s a minimalist… throws pretty much everything away and I am a chronic hoarder… my home at some times has been a few weeks of illness away from appearing on one of those dreadful Channel 4 shows! Well this prompted me searching the internet for anything that would help two twenty-somethings mutually keep house without injury and/or arrest being used on either/both parties. And so searching the internet, like one does, I came across a website that has literally changed my life forever… www.flylady.net…I even blogged about it in that previous blog I sometimes mention… and I read with interest and I acted upon what I read slow and steady. (Edd never moved into my house though :) )

Going back a moment, to the planning for the focus on cultivation, there was a request around the time of planning for this project for people to share things they thought useful and I shared the testimonial Marla Ciley (aka The FLYlady) herself shares about her own cultivation project, what prompted it, how it progressed and how it ultimately led her to be doing work every day that she loves.

Anyway I will not go through my entire story or even tell you how the FLYlady system works… because she does a fine job of that herself.

But I will tell you a little of how it has changed my life.

1. I now know how to get out of the mess I sometimes find myself in- I just pare everything back to the basics, asking myself... What am I already doing?… What can I piggyback onto those things to make life a little easier?
2. I am much more gentle with myself- I do less screaming and crying when things go wrong these days, I still get frustrated beyond belief, but it isn't quite as intense and it’s much shorter lived.
3. I have a group of amazing friends all over the world that I never expected to find, and they are my constant encouragement and blessing.
4. It’s sometimes okay to think of yourself as a part responsible adult, part little kid who wants to go outside and play…. It’s also very important to be firm with, as well as nice to, the little kid part of yourself!
5. Every day/month/year gets a little better- not all at once… in fact I haven’t even reached the point where I can smoothly navigate every habit I’d like to keep just to be able to get to and from my bed every day! But Christmases are joyful if not perfect and I find so much more time to appreciate things than I used to.
6. I rediscovered my spirit, and my spirituality- maybe a whole other blog for another day!
7. I feel generally much less abnormal about the state of my home… I grew up with the phrase “Everyone else’s *insert room/area/whole house* aren't like this” being repeated, in various insidious and confidence shattering guises, that I’d often feel so overwhelmed by getting started I just wouldn't. Why bother when you can never measure up?! Well NOT ANY MORE! (I still struggle with this, but I smile and keep going)
8. I know it’s okay to be a little obsessive about things… it can be a great motivator, but I must keep it in check and remember to REST!
9. I discovered the joy of writing again, because I discovered the joy of reading again and was really inspired by some of the things I read that I wanted to share my experiences too
10. Finally it’s “Progress not Perfection”... that’s what it’s about, there would be NO life WITHOUT living… the moving along is part of the joy of it… there is no final state or final answer within life…. nothing is perfect because nothing ever stops… I am still working to let perfectionism go…(see point 7) it’s probably going to be my lifetimes work, but I’m absolutely okay with that.

You’ll see that most of what I have noticed has changed is almost nothing to do with housework… (if you skipped going to look at the FLYlady website you'll have read this entire blog and wondered where housework came into it at all!) you see that’s mainly because those parts don’t really matter so much because the thing to really do is Finally Love Yourself.

Cultivating Thoughts... Day Two

So those who visit my house at the open don't get invited in.  Because things are in disarray.  Tonight I dreamed of a space that works for our family...  What do we need how do we connect to the garden...  What is our sitting room even for?

Helpful stuff to download in a brain doodling session,  which I very much enjoyed.

Really surprisingly the sense of satisfaction and closure from writing the next day's date on the subsequent page is nostalgia inducing from my previous career... It's unexpectedly pleasant.

The picture shows the centre of the diagram with the room in question in the background. (It is just stacked full with stuff)

Cultivating thoughts... Day One

Those of you who have been with me from the beginning in what seems like another life and was indeed another blog... May remember that I like actions. I like actions very much... Doing stuff is where it's at as far as I'm concerned.

I've tried many things/hobbies/pursuits over the last 30 years... I play recorder, flute, piano, ukulele, act, (can't dance have tried doesn't prevent me treading the boards anyway), poi spinning, card making, sketching, painting, colouring, pastels (oil and chalk!), cooking, baking, website design, desktop publishing, loom knitting, cross stitch, candle making etc... etc... etc...

I've joined choirs, bands, societies, clubs, churches, teams... I've given up meat and chocolate (never try to start both concurrently) given up the later with the temptation of a lovely chocolate cake and then given up former with trying to live with my carnivorous father's attempts at vegetarian cooking as I became bored with cheese sauce a'la frozen veg and got a little too thin.

All in all I am a great starter... And if pushed (or I enjoy it) I'll stick at something. But the dead blogs of the past are, unfortunately, testament to why I find giving up easier than sustaining something long term. I did teach myself to ride my bike without stabilisers in a concerted effort one afternoon aged 10 and aged 19 I read an entire book about writing HTML cover to cover, even the dedication, but most of the websites I designed never made it past the file structure of my C drive and I haven’t ridden a bike in years.

However, with a little persuasion, I've been encouraged to take up a challenge this month to coincide with the month of Ramadan by the team at New Unity in London. Rather than the idea of denial and self sacrifice I have often associated with Lenten rituals, I've been reminded how important it is to CULTIVATE FOR GROWTH... Read about the idea here and Andy Pakula's message here.

Aside- Saturday I ate a really rather sour and tiny strawberry from a three year old plant... It was dreadful... It was a lucky strawberry to exist at all, but I haven't tended that pot in ages and the compost therein is certainly spent.

And so I thought upon what I would like to cultivate in myself. And if #WeBecomeWhatWeDo all in all I decided like to be less bothered by stuff.

I'd like to worry less and achieve more.

This seems simple enough and if I were of a stronger, more tough and decisive persuasion that statement alone would be enough and I could get on with my life... Although if that were the case I'd most likely not worry so much in the first place and there is the rub.

So I realised I needed to work out a practice, which is going to support my new found position. And looking back over the past history of abandoned projects this one had to be easy enough to do, not take up too much time, and it needed to give me the sense of satisfaction of a job well done that means I'll stick with it for the duration and not fade out part way through.

What I have realised is that I actually achieve loads, but I am really terrible at recognising and celebrating stuff I do make things happen and I am also chronically inclined to defer doing something, either until the very last opportunity, or just abandon an idea completely and in the process letting people down or carrying a large amount of guilt around afterwards for no discernable good reason. That sort of pattern doesn't leave much time for celebration or satisfaction.

I decided early on in considering this cultivation that I like writing… I’ve been enjoying putting this blog together for the last few hours and I’m still enjoying it, but I'm excited by the idea just now and I realise I couldn't possibly do this every day! There are also many projects like #100happydays or the post three positive things to your Facebook page for a week... which I have been nominated to do and ignored... I only got half way through the lovely Gretchen Rubin's book The Happiness Project before I had become overwhelmed by all the ideas I'd thought of to try out!

So inspiration struck me that when I'm stuck at something I draw a diagram. I have a love affair with A3 paper and felt tipped pens... and I treat these diagrams with the utmost respect.

• Bimonthly at work I draw out a new one to highlight any up coming projects or important dates to my colleagues and pin it up on the wall by my desk.
• If I am listening to a lecture or trying to learn a new set of instructions to work a particular computer system in my job I doodle my way to understanding with page after page of colourful hand written notes and pictures which I use as a visual reference later on and eventually fix in my mind so I no longer have to read them and can navigate my way clear when I revisit a topic.

A very famous gentleman has the copyright on one form of creating these diagrams, but honestly I think I knew about creating them long before I ever read a book about the process... I'm naturally inclined to connect stuff in that way.

So I stayed at my desk a little while longer after work today and started writing/drawing until I became distracted and couldn't think of another thing to put down without having to work too hard to draw it out of my brain... and I felt better for having "downloaded" my thoughts.

So this project book was picked up after work today... I cracked out my new tin of pens!

I drew it a nice cover!

and I took some time to make a quick copy of the earlier prototype thought web from the afternoon.

A blurry Day One!

The plan is to draw a different one each day... the first one is stuff that was floating around in my head come a Monday afternoon in one of the busiest periods of my life so far! But there are other things I'd like to explore that allow me step that bit closer to cultivating the kind attitude which allows me to just get on and do stuff. So the first one is called Aleks' Brain and I didn't mind sharing it but I can't promise that they will all be public access!

I will however make an effort to share an associated photo... but the point of the book is it's real and it's offline... it's physically sitting in my conservatory begging to be played with!

The pens are good too! :)

So I've been quiet... I've been in here thinking....

Firstly this post is going to be a little personal, if you've read back through my posts or you will do... I never intended this blog to be so personal. I hope that in the future it needn't be so revealing and that I actually have some more local and community based stuff I am involved in to shout from the roof tops about.

But for now I want you to consider these three statements:

• I want to change the world.

• The world changes. I change.

• I already change the world a little every day.

I want to take a few moments of your time to think about perspective.
Now I am a person who deeply agrees with the first statement.
Many of my friends are too... on the whole that's why they are my friends, but most of us share more than that drive to make a difference.
We also share something more important and vital to how we view the world.
We're human and we struggle with our human brains... now this blog isn't about my mental health per say... although being ill has been the reason I've been so quiet for the first part of 2014 despite having plans to have written about six or seven posts on various things which have come up and begged to be written about!
It's a LOT of burden to want to make a difference... many of us unfortunately feel we're going against the current cultural norms if we speak out or stamp our feet... we shouldn't feel like this... we need to carry on talking AND listening.

Consider the second statement. Essentially we can't stop change... try as we might time moves on, we get a day older, we live, we grow etcetera etcetera! The world is dynamic... constantly changing and moving... and it takes us with it whether we want it to or not. Embrace this shifting... we're on a ride that isn't going to stop moving... so learn to relax into it... don't fight it... jumping up in the air doesn't defeat gravity... gravity is much bigger than you and constant jumping just makes you tired! :)

The third statement for me brings things full circle. I am already making a change.... if I'm thinking and acting in a changing way I am impacting my community... the ripples are already spreading and I don't need to make HUGE waves.... because if we all just ripple a little more BIG things can happen... but they don't need to... because small things do just as well.

I know this probably sounds like a weak answer to the worlds BIG problems! But you know what? It's really important to realise you can't solve them all alone... it FREES you up to actually start changing the things you can change.

I smile a lot... I am a VERY cheerful person... going back to my mental health for a minute... I often have a hard time with people believing I could possibly ever be depressed at all so sunny is my general disposition!
I make a point to smile AT people... and say please and thank you... and even... BLESS YOU in response to just normal stuff not just sneezes! It creates a connection between those around you, it also gets smiles returned and they get passed onto someone else because you just lightened the receivers world a little.

I want you to know how much changing that perspective makes a difference... recognising you already make a difference makes a difference. So put away the stick you're using to beat yourself up for:

• not completing all those projects you started
• not having cooked all the recipes you collected from last month's magazines which looked AMAZING
• not having found time to plant the seeds/bulbs/plants you bought last summer/autumn/winter
• anything else you just didn't do yet!

Spring is here NOW... and it's going to turn into the Summer somehow... be it a wet or dry, hot or cold.
Go out into the world and create some ripples.

Imagine this... Re-imagine this

Imagine this scenario…

A young man from migrates to the UK, he doesn’t have anywhere in particular to live when he arrives, so stays in different places and uses his network of friends to find work (cash in hand). He drinks and is physically violent towards his partner when he does. He has several romantic relationships with different British women, these result in an array of children to different mothers up and down the country, he never pays any maintenance for these children. He eventually he settles down in one place long enough to meet a young woman, a migrant from his home country, she doesn’t speak any English. She came here speculatively with nowhere to live either or any contacts she was just looking for a better life. They take jobs in the UK, they rely on the NHS but they don’t claim any additional welfare. They have a son and eventually get married. They only speak their native language at home and spend most of their time with others from their religious and cultural background at the large religious centre their community set up in their city they don’t integrate into the British way of life. As he grows up their son doesn’t speak English either, so when he gets to school he needs help learn the language as well. As their son grows up his mother can’t read is school books with him or help him with homework, his father doesn't really care. Later in her life despite living in the UK for many years the woman still doesn’t know more than a few words of broken English and relies on her husband has his own small business for work. When when she is widowed she relies on her teenage son to communicate with important stuff like taxes and bills…. You get the picture need I go on?

Are you niggled by this story? 

What is it that bothers you?

The people who arrive in the UK with no plan?

Their use of an NHS, which they haven’t paid taxes into?

The fact that they cannot properly support their child’s education?

Do you worry that this is going on now all the time?

That this is an increasing problem which we can't stop?

That our boarders are going to be flooded by people who have no intention of integrating into British life?

Then Re-imagine...

How do you feel if I reveal that the year that these migrants came to the UK was 1945/6? And although I took some small liberties with the facts that essentially this story describes my grandparents?

My grandfather was stationed in Perth, Scotland during WWII and never went home to Poland. My grandmother was brought to the UK by the British army when she was released from forced labour when Germany was liberated. She too was Polish.

When I read this editorial via my friend +Andy Pakula on Thursday of this week. I was not surprised. I was pretty used to racism by the time I was at school. When you’re white the prejudice is pretty insidious anyway and a great number of people convince themselves that it isn’t that bad, because it’s not like you look that different so they can say what they like.  Since “They’re not racist but…” you have a weird name… where were you born… when did you come to Britain… will you ever go home…. why do you celebrate those odd festivals… what is that strange food in your lunch box?

No child deserves to be bullied. Full stop.But the constant stream of bigoted and racist rhetoric in the media and by certain sections of society is affecting the lives of vulnerable children today.

Children repeat what they hear at home. When was I trainee teacher in 2008 my classes generally struggled with my foreign name, but I would tell them about my cultural background and some of the history of my family knowing that there were now again first generation British Poles like my father in classrooms in our school and it was important that these children were welcomed. One day I had a really memorable conversation with a child I will call Ryan. Ryan was 10 and White English/British, his family had emigrated to Australia and then subsequently returned to the UK. He was “local” he was a nice kid, but what came out of his mouth still haunts me. It went something like this:

How is it being back in Hometown Ryan? My dad’s still not got work Miss, he dad says it’s all people who come over here Miss, like the Polish, Miss… coming over here taking the jobs, not paying their taxes.

I was dumbstruck. This child was barely 10 years old. And here I was listening to the insidious racist line that has been repeated in this country generation after generation. Replace the nationality or race of the “incomer” but the message is always the same. I remember my response was something like, “Excuse me Ryan but I pay my taxes” To be honest having attempted to teach Ryan percentages the week before I’m not even sure he knew what taxes were. But most importantly despite, all my training and experience, I had no idea how to challenge him.  If he’d said something about another students skin colour, or used some identifiably racist slang to describe a particular person or group … I had a protocol for that! My brain would have kicked into action and something would have been done. But in between my ears was a small voice that told me I had no right to question the “God given right of the English” to be masters of their own land.

You see it’s not just about what we say to our children. It’s the way we pass on our insecurities, here was a child whose whole identity was wrapped up with defending the home of his ancestry and that message is getting stronger. It’s in the media, the government use it to spread fear and hatred. And I occasionally pause as I write my name and nationality on a job application form. I’m British, I was born here, but what if they don’t believe me, maybe they’ll assume I don’t speak very good English, maybe I made up the qualifications, my grandparents were aliens after all.

Welcome to 2014- An Individualist Like Me

I have been racking my brain lately... or rather it's been racking itself. Recent events in my life have kind of picked my head up and given it a shake. Therefore I have found the contents rattled and spilling out at various points into conversations and meetings with others. Many of my friends are great listeners, many of them understand. But sometimes something just needs to be written as concisely and eloquently as possible and sent out into the world where it can live on it's own.

I have a serious problem with a word...

Freak- as defined in a Google search in these terms-

a person, animal, or plant with an unusual physical abnormality.
"a few freaks have been discovered, one amazing cat tipping the scales at no less than 43 lbs"

synonyms: aberration, abnormality, irregularity, oddity, monster, monstrosity, malformation, mutant;
freak of nature
"the mouse was a genetically engineered freak"

informal
a person regarded as strange because of their unusual appearance or behaviour.
"her books offer us the independent girl as something of a freak"
synonyms: oddity, eccentric, eccentric person, peculiar person, strange person, unorthodox person, individualist, free spirit, maverick, misfit; crank, lunatic; queer fish, oddball, weirdo, weirdie, nutcase, nut, nutter; odd bod; wacko, screwball, kook; case
"they were dismissed as a bunch of freaks"

My reasoning is this... I've been called this... I've been called lots of things, but this one hurts to remember and for some reason memories including this word are more vivid than most. It was used to describe me and my twin sister by some particularly idiotic members of my school community.

I think the reason it hurts so much is that as an insult it's true... I could ignore other words... like whore... or even the boys who found it ironic to shout.. HEY SEXY! I took these as untrue and therefore easily dismissed. But by definition my sister and I were and still are an irregularity... we're identical twins... we're rare and we're odd. We look and sound the same and once in our school uniforms despite our differing heights you'd have to know us very well to tell the difference. We also relish each others company, we're close and a conversation with my sister is even more rewarding to me than a conversation with any other person in the world. We talk we, philosophise, we share our separate spheres of knowledge knowing that the other will almost instantly understand if not accept our point of view.

The other parts of the definition that fits us very well is our unusual appearance. We're taller than average... especially me... and we're of Polish extraction which means in our case fair hair, extremely high cheek bones, piercing blue eyes, a pronounced nose and a strong jaw line... I recently described this to a friend in the following terms. "You know when you look at a Polish woman that if you mess with her she'll break your spine."

But the reason I'm writing this isn't to bemoan the bullying of my teenage years hurtful as it was. I'd like to reclaim the definition... I particularly like this chain of synonyms in the definition... individualist, free spirit, maverick

Being individual is hard for anyone. People can fail to separate your identity from that of your family or friendship group, but for me as much as I love my sister we really struggled with developing separate and distinct identities. With a few of my traits this meant almost suppressing things about myself in order to make myself different from her.

She was markedly alternative so I tried my hardest to be as "normal" as possible...
She was the Goth... I was the one in Marks and Spencer clothes
She was alternative and Pagan... I was the mainstream Christian
She was gay... I was straight
She did a science degree... I did an arts one

However I think that as get older I discover that really I am just as individual and unique as I choose to be. I like to dress in my own style and to suit my own shape. By beliefs are wide and varied and take in many different views and traditions. I'm bisexual and also pretty uninterested in living alongside any predefined gender stereotype either. And after my Music degree I studied IT instead and now spend my work time divided between training systems and using the creative technologies to design learning packages.

I guess those who called me a freak were right... but not for the reasons they were thinking of. Prejudice and fear is the root of many scenarios that result in bullying and insults, however I've moved on so far from where I was when I was 11 that I think that in my 30th year I intend to embrace my real self and be free-spirited and maverick. It's really the only way to make a difference.